


Stay

by Daphnean



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Feelings, M/M, Resolution
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-02
Updated: 2017-05-02
Packaged: 2018-10-26 23:15:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10796787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daphnean/pseuds/Daphnean
Summary: Yifan leaves. There isn't a middle ground or compromise that can change the past, but Joonmyun wants to know if he should look for a future between them.





	Stay

**Author's Note:**

> I blame this entire thing on Curtain by Joonmyun. I have been obsessed with this song while I've been in this depressive funk and somehow my brain decided I needed to write angst. It's not my usual fare. I know this may seem pretty heart-wrenching, but I promise you there's a happy ending.

Some things never changed; the way he always burned his tongue on his first sip of morning coffee, the bottle of shampoo beside his in the shower caddy. Joonmyun felt like he was creating a haunted house one memento at a time. Despite his knowledge it would sting, he left Yifan’s pillow beside his, buried his nose in it some days just because scent was closely tied to memory, and like that he could pretend Yifan was just away for a little while. He likened it to pressing the snooze button on his alarm clock, just five more minutes.

The worst part was that so far, it’d been a beautiful spring. Mornings were bright, the tiniest bit of winter chill lingering before the sunrise. It even turned the dark of his coffee warmer, when it caught the cup in sunbeam. The tree he could see from his kitchen window had just started to bloom; creamer to ease the bitter taste of another day alone.

Chanyeol had chastised him. _Hyung, how can you turn the season of rebirth into something so morbid?_ Joonmyun was the king of silver linings, normally. Yifan had said he had never met someone before who could turn loss into victory; stand in a downpour and think of the thirsty plants on the windowsill while he took on water like a sinking ship. His heart resembled wreckage, full of just as many holes he couldn’t patch up. Not with nights out with his best friends, nights in with Byul curled in his lap.

Oddly enough, it was Baekhyun who seemed to understand him the most. While Jongdae and Chanyeol whined at him to go out with them that evening, Baekhyun would kick their shins, berating them both for being disrespectful while he’d sneak food from Joonmyun’s tray. In his own way too, Kyungsoo understood. His silence was punctuated, stares a beat too long. If he had the words, he didn’t know how to express them. It was equal footing for Joonmyun, who had no idea how to accept them in return.

Two weeks had stuck like honey to his ribs; the passage of time toying with him. It was as sudden as a car accident, a smash of metal and sudden goodbyes. Yifan had been faltering, that much Joonmyun knew, but he also knew no amount of his prodding would make his lover suddenly open up to him about something weighing down on him so heavily. Joonmyun had ached to take this coat from his shoulders, to take both his hands into his own and warm them with kisses.

Yifan had snuffed them out like they hadn’t been burning for two years. He left his mug in the cabinet, two of his rings on the bedside. Joonmyun had a box ready for them, ready for when he’d be able to let them go. But unlike Yifan, he never had an easy time with that.

And that was the clutch, the tug to his wrist that kept him leaving all of the other man’s possessions where they last rested to collect dust. He deserved answers, and some mornings he looked at the mug beside his, chip along the rim, and asked it why. Why hadn’t he already smashed the ceramic to pieces on the floor? Why did Yifan say that he loved him only to leave? Why had the man been swallowing shadows, hiding them as bags beneath his eyes, for months?

Why did Joonmyun still think he was coming back?

\--

Three weeks had passed and Kyungsoo invited him over for lunch. Joonmyun let himself get lost in the methodical way the younger man rinsed the rice, pinky catching a stray grain and pushing it back with the rest. Soft piano music played from his phone, the kitchen warm from the stovetop.

“Everyone’s afraid to ask,” Kyungsoo began slowly, finally putting the rice inside the cooker and setting it. “But I’m afraid if I don’t, you’re going to become a black hole.”

“Melodramtic.” Joonmyun tried to tease, but his voice felt a little too tinny to his own ears.

A pointed look caught his breath in his throat. Kyungsoo started cutting mushrooms with steady fingers. “It’s okay to be sad. Angry.”

“I’m both less and more than those things,” Joonmyun replied, deflating till he felt like he should remain boneless in the barstool.

A sigh, and the younger man used the back of his wrist to push his glasses further up his nose from where they’d slid down with his cutting. “You still love him?”

“Like I think he’s going to come back.” Joonmyun answered quicker than even he expected.

“He’s not going to turn back to see if you’re holding a torch for him,” Kyungsoo stopped cutting as he spoke, setting the knife beside the cutting board, “If some people fight and others fly, Yifan has been airborne for a while now. And I don’t think he’ll land anytime soon.”

His knuckles were pale, nails biting crescent into his palms as he listened. Somewhere amongst the pretty melancholy he’d been drowning in, stirrings of something concrete start to twist in his chest, leaving it hard for him to breathe.

“So I’m supposed to clip his wings then? Chase after him and pin him down like he’s something to collect? I don’t fight. I don’t flee. I wait and wait and that’s all I’m good at doing. I waited for him to tell me,” Joonmyun’s spoke with words tumbling out of him before he could even process them, filter them into something the other man would want to hear. They left him raw and ugly. “And look at what it did. Why do I have to be the one to change, Kyungsoo?”

He could see the broth bubbling along the edges of the pot on the stovetop, feel the bead of sweat itching along his hairline.

Kyungsoo met his gaze briefly, picked up the knife again to continue cutting. “Sometimes there isn’t an equal give and take, in relationships. Some days, you’ll be wrung dry. But I think, that if all that tension you felt was hard on you, it had to be unbearable for Yifan to experience. Add on he likely could tell it was effecting you as well-”

Joonmyun rarely interrupted people, but he interjected, “And just saying he had to go? That he couldn’t do this anymore was going to be easier on me?”

“I never said that.” Kyungsoo was far calmer than he was, knife still steady in his hand. “I don’t think Yifan is right. But I think if you want answers, the only way you’ll get them is if you go and ask him yourself.”

The rice cooker chimed as it finished. Joonmyun felt full of too many emotions to digest, but he still made room for the doenjang jjigae anyways.

\--

The apartment building was old, but clean. Baekhyun hadn’t even heard his question before he was writing the address down on a scrap of paper on his desk, handing it to him with a smile.

“Save a punch for me,” the younger male chirped, giving a wink. It was close enough to encouragement to embolden Joonmyun to leave work that night and drive straight to the quiet neighborhood across the city where Yifan had been hiding. That alone had surprised him. He had expected the other man to finally return to China, to his mother.

That still didn’t mean he’d answer the door, give Joonmyun any answers at all, but still he let his knuckles rap against the door twice. The knock was jaunty, almost musical. It was a sharp contrast to the abrasive pulse throbbing along his temples.

Yifan opened the door. Joonmyun drank him in, felt like he’d returned after a long shift to the warmth of their apartment just by being in the other man’s presence. The blond dye was fading from Yifan’s roots, the circles under his eyes had purpled further, and more than anything he looked afraid. While he wasn’t yet trembling, Joonmyun expected him to. He was swimming in a too large sleep shirt, baggy black sweatpants, and Joonmyun still loved him.

Too many questions pushed against his teeth. The urge to dig his fingers into the fabric of his t-shirt and shake him was almost stronger than his will to speak. A moment of silence began to stretch and stagnate between them.

Joonmyun resisted only a moment longer before tugging the other man into his arms, braced for him to stumble; Yifan never had the most grace. Momentum nearly toppled them both, but Joonmyun did the one thing he was good at and stood his ground. He held onto the other man so tightly that if he tried to fly, he was taking him too.

Stiff arms, a too-long torso suddenly melded against him. No one ever said they fit together perfectly, but Joonmyun had always felt they did. Even now, even after a month apart and so much unsaid between them.

“I was so patient.” Joonmyun’s voice shook like Yifan’s shoulders.

Yifan buried his face into the fabric of his dress shirt, both hands holding on like Joonmyun was the one who had run before. “I have a sister.”

Joonmyun had waited far too long to interrupt now, to stop himself from hearing the truth when it had been rubbing raw between them for months.

“Half-sister. She’s…she’s a drug addict. She strings guys along like Christmas lights, burning them out in a matter of days. We stopped talking about a year before you and I got together. But she calls me out of the blue, telling me they’re going to take her baby. I didn’t even know she had a son…”

So many answers after a drought left Joonmyun overwhelmed. He pulled back to look at the other man in the face, cupping it with both hands.

“His father is in prison. My sister might end up the same way, but…the one thing she wants to do right is protect her son. I…it’s going to be a long fight, for custody, but I want to take him in Joonmyun. But then I thought of us and our life and asking you to step up with me is…is a lot to ask of anyone. Even someone as amazing as you.”

Joonmyun closed his eyes. “I expected a better reason to put me through so much…but I don’t think there is one enough to excuse what you did.”

The other man jolted in his hands, but didn’t pull away. Joonmyun felt his stubble beneath his thumbs, his palms.

“Life rarely goes according to plan. I expect messy, I expect some days to be so mad at you I can’t even get the keys into the lock, expect days where I sleep on the couch because I forgot something important…but what I want to expect is that you’ll still love me and be there in the end.”

Yifan placed his large hands, slightly colder, over his own. “I do love you, Joonmyun! I just…I was so panicked. I’ve never felt so unprepared and blindsided. Meetings with CPS and my sister and-”

Leaning forward and slightly up, Joonmyun brushed their noses, making Yifan’s words stop. “I don’t believe that yet. I know you run, I know I stay, but…but this time I need you to come back. If you bring someone with you…I’ll be ready for the journey when it comes.”

Somewhere, in the mess of this sloppy reunion, he’d started crying. Yifan had followed, hot tears sliding beneath both of their fingers. Time seemed to ignore them for a breath, then two, allowing Yifan to tug him into the sparsely decorated studio where they crumpled. Yifan held him close, caged him in his long arms like he wasn’t going to let go. Joonmyun almost believed he wouldn’t this time.

\--

They talked so late into the night that Joonmyun had to go into work with no sleep at all. Baekhyun had looked alarmed, immediately had come around his desk and shook his shoulders.

“Yah, what did he say to you? I’d been pissed enough at him before, but if he said anything else stupid I swear to God, I’ll-”

Joonmyun gave a very weary smile. “He said everything wrong, as usual. But…I think we’re finally…I think we’re going to be okay.”

Baekhyun finally lowered himself back onto his heels, surprised. “Then why do you look like shit?”

A genuine laugh startled out of him, shocking them both. “I…I didn’t sleep. We talked things out like normal couples do.”

“You are not a normal couple,” Baekhyun countered. “But if you both are feeling better, then I guess I can’t say anything.”

“You will anyways.” Joonmyun gave a small, knowing smile.

Baekhyun’s grin was megawatt in response. “Smart hyung.”

\--

After three long months, Yifan’s rings and mug finally ended up in the cardboard box, just so that they could move to the new apartment with plenty of room for a four year old boy to have the space to grow. Joonmyun had actually spent the whole morning cleaning properly. Minseok would have been proud, if not still judgmental about the crumbs under the couch. There was only so much a slob like Joonmyun could do to fight old habits.

He nearly jumped off of the couch when he heard keys at the door, the shuffling of bags. As he turned the corner, he drank Yifan in as he always did when the other man returned. That gummy grin that felt more like home than any place did greeted him, as did the small, shy smile of the little boy beside him.

“Hello, Zitao,” Joonmyun leaned forward, hands braced on his knees to greet him. “My name is Joonmyun. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is AU for a reason. While everyone has their own feelings on Yifan leaving EXO, this fic isn't meant to present any feelings on that particular event. This is about this universe's Yifan and Joonmyun and their story. If you read and enjoyed this piece, thank you. It really helped soothe my heart in an odd way. I never usually write angst, even if there is (always for me) a happy ending involved. I'm really happy with Joonmyun's character here and the writing I presented. I hope if you're struggling in some way that you too can heal in time.
> 
> EXO and all other Kpop entertainers presented here are real people and so I remind you that this is just a fic, like a play with their stage personas as the actors. This is not intended to be a representation of who these men and women are or are not. Remember to love and respect them always. And thanks for reading! <3


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